Amid the spotlight on Reeves’ Spring Forecast the Tobacco and Vapes Bill also heads into its report stage on Wednesday. It has two amendments with alternative approaches. The DUP’s Sammy Wilson would just raise the age of sale to 21:
“This amendment makes it an offence to sell tobacco products, herbal smoking products and cigarette papers to a person under the age of 21, rather than to people born on or after 1 January 2009.”
Nigel Farage has tabled one to get rid of the ban and leave the age at 18:
‘This amendment removes the generational ban on selling tobacco products to people born on or after 1 January 2009.”
New polling from Yonder Consulting for smokers’ rights group Forest shows it’s the old and government-employed who are backing the ban. It presented the three options (generational ban, 21 sale age, keep status quo) to 2,000 Brits from 17-18 March. 66% of 18-24-year-olds support measures other than the government’s generational ban, broadly split between keeping it the same and raising the age of sale to 21. Their successors will be nannied into the black market…
Previous polling has found the public to be against a raising of the age by two to one. Interestingly there is a split between public sector and private sector workers. The private sector backs keeping the age of sale at 18 by 26% to 21%, and is less keen on the generational ban by one point. Bureaucrats gonna bureaucrat…
Tomorrow sees the second reading of the Tobacco and Vapes Bill as Streeting pushes through a generational smoking ban and powers to ban cigarettes in public places like parks. Along with a crackdown on their safer alternative – vapes…
Recent polling by Yonder Consulting, commissioned by Smokers’ Rights group Forest, has found the public are against the generational smoking ban by a margin of almost two-to-one. 60% of Brits say that if people are allowed to drive a car, join the army, purchase alcohol, and vote at 18, they should also be allowed to buy cigarettes and other tobacco products. That’s compared to 31% who don’t. Not that Starmer has much of a problem with being unpopular…
Forest director Simon Clark says “creeping prohibition will simply drive the sale of tobacco underground and into the hands of criminal gangs and illicit traders.” There goes £9 billion in tax revenue…
A month after Labour’s plans to ban smoking outside pubs and in parks were exposed, research on the public’s view is pouring in. It’s far from a closed case…
Lobby groups like ASH claim that there is overwhelming support for draconian measures on tobacco which is jumped on by Labour, which insists there has been “a consensus for a long time now that we want to see a smoke-free country.” The data doesn’t bear that out…
YouGov’s snap research had support for a ban outside pub gardens at 51%. A new poll from Yonder Consulting now has less than half of the public support the measure. If you remove the don’t knows, 53% say smoking outside should be allowed, compared to 47% pro-ban. Brits usually support a ban on anything that moves – the fact they aren’t behind Starmer on this one is significant…
Simon Clark, director of smokers’ rights group Forest, who commissioned the poll, tells Guido: “What is clear is that the government has no mandate to ban smoking outside pubs. It wasn’t in the Labour Party manifesto and the public only found out about it after the plan was leaked to a national newspaper.” It’s goodnight sweet prince to the hospitality industry, too…
Lucy Powell on LBC, asked by Tom Swarbrick for her reaction to Labour MP Samantha Niblett’s call for a ‘summer of sex’ debate in Parliament: “I personally don’t own any sex toys, but each to their own… I’m not really sure that’s the right place for it, no.”
